


monster

by AbandonedWorld



Series: hope is just a stranger wondering how it got so bad [1]
Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, M/M, Mild Language, Painplay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-07-26
Updated: 2011-09-14
Packaged: 2017-10-21 18:42:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/228396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AbandonedWorld/pseuds/AbandonedWorld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erik is out of his mind, Charles is his prisoner. Slight AU – no beach divorce or wheelchair Charles, but set after that time frame, and WITH flashbacks. Pre and post-slash strewn throughout.</p><p>**On Hiatus until Nanowrimo is complete! Writing 50k on another XMFC fic has taken me from updating this, but not forever!**</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. you were my conscience

_The first thing Charles Xavier noticed was the dryness of his mouth. The second was the lack of focus from his eyes. Blurry. Everything was blurry._

 _If only things could have remained as simplistic. As painless._

xXx

Erik's obsession had steadily grown on him, as if it were a suffocating blanket of unimaginable strength, strangling him, killing him slowly. It felt as though an iron sheath was slipping itself over his senses, with all the precision of a madman and his sharpened blades. There. There it was once again: a fantasy so twisted and devilishly evil, even he himself was put off by the constant thoughts and acts swirling around his tormented skull.

 _He_ had been the one to leave Xavier's mansion - to break up the "G-Men" and all that ridiculous, nonsensical bullshit. He worked for no one. Well. He worked _well_ with no one. That was a fact he had learned many years ago by the hands of his creator, Sebastian Shaw. Or Klaus Schmidt. Or Satan. Or Motherfucking Arsehole. Either term worked _just_ good enough to name a man that had no true identity. So he left. Erik had left because of so many confusing, muddled, _different_ events that wavered on his independent nature. He had begun to _rely_ on Charles. On the kids. On Charles.

Living in Xavier's home...it was an alteration of a lifestyle he had been living since the war. Since his mother was murdered. Since Schmidt had all but adopted him and his useful _gift_. Lehnsherr's stomach rolled over on itself at the wandering thoughts of those blackened days - and yet Charles had helped him overcome many of those hellish _waking_ nightmares. He would simply wiggle his fingers, stare into two icy, German eyes and things would... _happen_ to Erik. Things he wasn't entirely at ease with. Memories? Recollections? _Warmth?_ It had all been too much. Yes, entirely too much.

That being said.

Erik's mind had been an incomplete, tangled mess since exiting Charles' happy little fuckery of a home. An array of hurt, regret and a steady flow of overwhelming insecure perceptions of himself - of his talent with metals - had recently begun taking their toll. His mind was working _against_ him rather than assisting him to become the greater man in his ongoing Brotherhood-supremacy mission. He felt confusion and doubt. Heartache and heartbreak. He _felt_ more than he ever had. More than he wanted to feel. Erik...Magneto – he _felt_ human. These revelations kept descending upon him as if he were the recipient of one rogue wave following the other, a vicious, unbreakable cycle that threatened to shadow whatever goodness had been left.

Those rampant, gut-wrenching emotions were always there now. Always waiting for his strength to falter, always prepared to bowl him over with their achingly powerful forces at a whim. Admittance would never be the solution, Erik knew that for absolute surety, and yet, every time, every _single_ time he allowed his heart to say such a foreign truth, all the pieces of his marked, emotive body weren't far behind.

It was the truth that brought Erik near irreversible madness. He _longed_ for his old friend. Yes. Achingly so.

Erik Lehnsherr... _missed_ Charles Xavier.

But there was also anger. And resentment. And hatred. And jealousy. But there was _love._ But...pain. Anguish, agony and rage. The turntable of broken thoughts that circulated throughout him had slowly weakened and fatigued Erik - a truth he was all to bitter to accept. A _truth_ he was eager to reverse. He wasn't _this_...this feeble minded fool over emotions that plagued ones beating heart, no. He was a machine, a brilliant mechanical device that had purpose, reason and god-fucking dammit, the ends _always_ justified the means.

 _'Change. Change it, Erik. Do it. Do it Do it Do it DO IT. Find him. Find him and make him see.'_

The images of his once friend - a formidable ally really - being bound, being shown and _made_ to understand, forced to see the err of his ways, were playing as a metronome of violence in Erik's head. Often, he caught himself licking his lips when thoughts of Charles' unrelenting - _imagined_ \- screams came to ring and echo within his ears. He enjoyed the fantastic taunts and crooked games he was going to play on Xavier and relished in the peace it brought him. Erik found he was able to sleep quite sound when those flickering images of Charles being so...so helpless had flashed through his war-ravaged consciousness. He used those fantasies to support him along in his efforts, in his daily activities until. Well, until it became more than an overwhelming desire - more than a crippling aftershock his mind was reeling from.

No, now? Now Erik _knew_ it bound to come to fruition.

He wanted to _punish_ Charles, just as that brilliant fuck of a genius-mind had done to him. The rejection. The blindsiding and the _control_ he had held over hi-- Erik was a splintered man by the end of their partnership; cut off and jagged from the wholeness he had spent so many years constructing against _people_ like Charles.

He was seething with a constant need and a desire to...to get a revenge so monumental it was all-consuming.

He would burn the entire world to the ground, only to make Charles _understand._

xXx

The mansion was a safe-haven and a refuge for the growing number of mutants seeking those exact qualities - this was not precisely a secret, and yet many did not know of its existence. Charles was...different since Erik had left - more reserved, more refined and yet, his interactive emotional levels had all but vanished. It was clear to any and all who were close to Charles - Hank, Moira, Alex and Sean - that _Magneto's_ exit had left a visible wound in Xavier's day to day.

So he would float in and out of minds as they passed him in the hallways, in the classrooms, in the cafeteria, on the stairs and in the labs. He would spend his moments reveling in the peaceful - youthful - thoughts that moved into his consciousness and surrounded him with a pleasant warmth he hadn't dared cling to in...well, too long. Charles' eyes would close upon themselves on a particularly sunny days, as the private lives of his students and peers would fill him up with just enough happiness to sustain him. To float him through the day.

Cerebro was no exception. He found solace in those facets of focus and in his searches for mutants and troubled minds alike. Charles often spent nights working alongside Hank in utter silence, listening in on the Beastly man as he went about tinkering with an endless line of electronics and technology. He would catch a fleeting murmur of pity for Charles, for missing his friend, his lov- before he would grunt and make it known how the quiet is not equated to silence. McCoy would shift uneasily and continue on, just as Charles had. As if nothing had changed.

Continue on and move forward. Keep going. He kept on going.

And yet, Charles knew the surface tensions and fear that his closest felt when around him; an uncomfortable side effect to losing more than he had realized he initially possessed in Erik.

Xavier felt this ugly distance as a result, and knew they had as well.

No one would dare approach Charles over matters concerning that of Erik Lehnsherr. That fated ship had sailed many weeks before, and truth to be told, it was that fear of Xavier's reaction that kept the subject stagnant. This lead to deafening silences as they followed the professor around, watching as he made his way onward in life; designing those final tweaks of a shiny new Cerebro with Hank, welcoming new students as they arrived, perfecting his mental controls over those who needed it most and with mounting pride, Charles honed the great gift of a pleasant smile. His face ever warm, ever rewarding and ever trusting, Charles secretly constructed a steel fortress around his heart. But he fooled no one. Those broken pieces may never grow back into the solid shape they had once been, but neither would they fall to the ground – they would never slip through the cracks again. Denial wouldn't ever come claim him again, as it had done in those last few moments with Erik.

Charles didn't feel regret or anguish over the events that lead to his-to Erik's departure. Charles simply didn't _feel_ any longer.

xXx

Erik signaled to Raven that he was leaving – was going on this journey alone, requiring no backup or help of any kind. He knew that's as well as it should be, anything more would be overkill. She swallowed the golf-ball sized lump inside of her blue throat and frowned, looking away as she closed two nervous, yellow eyes. Her heart was beating harder than it ever had, as if a train were on course for imminent collision.

"Raven?" Erik called, waving his hand in front of her inattentive face. "Mystique?" he asked again, grabbing one of her arms and swinging her around to stand directly in front of him. "You will take care of the others, yes?" His words were orders, and yet there was a calmness to them. A kindness that didn't mold to the actions he was to perform against a man she had once called brother. A serene-like quality to that voice that down right frightened her.

"You won't be... _too_ bad on him?" she asked, pouting and peering down at her shuffling feet. "Bad?" Erik asked, smirking and raising his eyebrows at her. "Define _bad_ , Mystique, please. Bad as in...harmful? Bad as in...beating?" He ended the conversation before the young mutant had time to make her concerns fully known, tilting his gaze upwards and slipping his sunglasses over his eyes.

Blissfully sunny. It _was_ a lovely day for a kidnapping, now, wasn't it?

"I'll return home by nightfall. Make sure _they_ don't wreck the place...and that the room is ready for our coming guest." Erik slid into the driver's seat of his black Lincoln and smiled up towards her. "It's for the best, Raven. I _need_ this, you understand." Magneto hadn't waited for her immature protests - her anguished stare - before setting off in the direction of Westchester, New York, his special helmet sitting comfortably on the warm leather beside him.

'Charles,' Raven thought, wiping a shaking hand across her torn face. Torn but spoken for, she knew there was nothing that could prevent what was coming.

xXx

Nighttime around _Xavier's School for Gifted Children_ was quiet, reserved and calm - exactly as Charles had set out for it to be. These kids needed the rest as much as his whirlwind of a mind, and tonight was no exception; the last few weeks around the familiar wooden halls and rooms of his home were more alive than they had ever been, and yet he felt hollow, focused on the constant astonishment that he felt absolutely _nothing._ Perhaps less than.

 _"Professor X?"_ a _nervous_ voice reached out to his mind, calling him and catching him off guard: a practice Charles wasn't entirely accustomed to. He returned Hank's mental dial by questioning him soothingly – forcefully – asking quite simply, what the problem was.

 _"Yes, Hank?"_

 _"I...I have a task that requires the use of your mental mutation, seeing as you are more powerful than any other telepa--"_

 _"Hank, what is it that you need?"_ Charles asked, cutting off the strange compliment Beast had been attempting to pay him.

 _"Well...I...we may have a location track on Erik, but if you could...focus and reach out to see if there's any way it coul--"_

 _"Ah, I see."_ Charles replied, unsure as to whether he _wanted_ to involve himself personally, completely without the use of Cerebro. Though, it _was_ all rather personal, if one must split hairs over such subjects, he would routinely remind himself.

 _"Do you need me to join you in Cerebro or are you in the lab?"_ Charles questioned, walking slowly from his study in the direction of McCoy's research hub. His feet felt heavier - weighted down with the metal trappings of Erik's own mass - as if the mechanical, metallic exile were there in person. Gravity was drawing him down, down into a pit of hell fire and fury, and he was all too aware of where those roads lead. He shook himself steady, hands releasing the tightly wound grip they had had on themselves.

 _"Be there shortly, Hank."_ Charles returned, not caring for the reply as he closed the mental connection; it made Xavier uneasy to be so open in the night - so available - even with the closest of friends. Since Erik had left, it was another one of those quirks he had buried alive and only dug up when deemed necessary. He wasn't angered that Hank had used his nightly consciousness "rounds" as a means to get the Professor's attention, but it was an issue that required an addressing to nonetheless. A quick, _'please, if you will, reach me by the telephone or by the grace of those legs God has given you,'_ rather than hacking his mind for personal gain. It didn't matter what lay in question.

Charles arrived and let himself in, coughing into the late air that moved throughout the large room. It smelled of sulfur and iron, steel and burnt rubber. Hank's work never ended, and this was a haven for Charles during the day – a recognition his sensory systems appreciated at this lonesome hour.

"Hank?" Charles asked, looking around the blue man's working stations, his two hands sitting comfortably in trousers he wished were already removed for the remainder of the evening. No reply. "Hank...?" Charles asked once more, checking the time on his watch and sighing with slight annoyance.

"It's quite late, Hank. If we could get on with it, I'd be greatly obliged."

He heard the faint sounds of a man's voice muffled and choked coming from the right side of the vast room. The lights had been switched off in that particular corner, the moon casting shadows that danced lazily on the white walls that surrounded Charles' dim, confused form. He listened in for Hank's mind, concentrating and projecting his mental reach in hopes of connecting with the young, brilliant - albeit intrusive - scientist.

 _"Hank? Hank, can you hear me?"_ Charles questioned, pulling his hands out and roaming two rapidly blinking eyes around the expanse of the space that lain in utter darkness. He felt a tantalizing chill - an ominous threat - loom overhead but couldn't quite place the familiarity he felt towards it. Towards _someone._

 _"Hank, answer me. Answer me now."_ Charles' voice was strong but wavered ever so slightly with a hint of fear, his body reacting. An intense situation he sensed he was about to be thrown head first into.

 _"Professor! GO, go! Ru-"_ Hank's mind had fired out, before fading to black, the connection once again severed, and this time painfully abrupt. That brief reconnection paired with the immediate void left Charles spinning, his eyes attempting to focus and adjust to the lack of light. Even the walls felt deceptive to Charles in that moment.

"Hello, Charles."

 _That voice._ That voice.

"....Erik? Why...why have you come here tonight?"


	2. so solid, now you're like water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charles and Erik at war, emotionally and physically. Pain and angst strewn throughout.

Charles' face was blank. That alone had fed a starved Erik all the sustenance he sought after. Xavier's expression gave name to the validation Erik had longed for so deeply in recent days. In those vacant, blue eyes - wide and _disturbingly_ empty - Erik found a hint of fear and... _something else_ he hadn't dared acknowledge. No, there would be no contemplation of... _that_ , well not since he had finalized the decision to go through with his future schemes. Erik simply stared at the man, in awe, in disgusting respect, with an overpowering intensity that ignited all the bated electricity between them.

He was complete. Erik was whole and complete in Charles' presence.

Fleeting as those warming emotions were, Erik knew it was neither the time nor place to battle the games of his heart versus the throbbing aches in his mind. He had to get Charles from the mansion, quietly and without harm. Was he to...convince? To coerce? To manipulate? Erik had gone through the options that lay themselves bare in his devious mind, yet even the best laid plans, he knew, were always doomed. He couldn't tell Charles the truth, couldn't be honest or direct nor could he be afraid of the man he was once so endeared to.

A man he had _cared_ so completely for, so freely. It was Erik's beating heart slamming violently within the crushing walls of his bones that brought those emotions raging back. He wanted - no, _longed_ \- to feel Charles against him. Experience those connections only they had shared. From Xavier's telepathic seductions to the touches of his dizzying fingers, Erik felt the weight of their past close in on him from all sides; decisions to embrace or abandon those nostalgic memories were begging for entry, and Erik needed all the power of his will to overcome.

Head swimming in an ocean of regret and need, Lehnsherr pierced that luring vail and tore down those sweet, sweet memories - one at a time. Tonight was _not_ that night. It wasn't as if time were allowing him any stolen moments with the genius that stand before him, _certainly not_ , no, tonight most definitely wasn't one for exploration and discovery. It was mission impossible, mission improbable, mission kidnap Charles Xavier.

So. Erik swallowed his heart and gave his mind permission to captain the helm of this sinking ship. Reason and thought over all other matters.

"I see you haven't changed... _much_ ," Erik spoke, pacing a line back and forth as though he were a caged animal poised to attack. His hands bored into the pockets of long black slacks, fingers twirling around a group of smooth metal spheres in an attempt to focus his attention elsewhere. Sparing Charles even a minimal amount of pain and suffering wasn't on the top of Erik's to-ruin list, but doing those sorts actions in this moment was _not_ part of Erik's far-reaching plans.

He felt his tongue, heavy and slick as it slid around the inside of his drying mouth. Erik wanted to remove the helmet, remove the blockade against Charles' warmth and light, knowing that his energy and force was waiting, waiting, waiting and patiently ready to slither and seep back into Erik's head.

"And I see _you've_ completely changed, my friend." Charles replied, settling himself, his back leaning comfortably against one of Hank's metal tables. Speaking of. "Is Hank alright?" The professor moved towards Erik when asking, lifting himself up on the tips of his loafers, trying to see behind the magnetic giant. He was concerned for his young friend, worried that Erik had done things he would regret by mornings light and wanted answers.

"He'll be fine, Charles. Sleeping quite comfortably behind the samples cabinet, if I do say so myself." Erik's smile was devious and calculated, heavy and brazen in a manner to which Charles had never seen prior. "What have you done to him, Erik?" Charles stared at the helmet adorned on the head of his one-time partner and swallowed the emptiness that came along with such cruel sights. The mind-reader's desires to fully wrap himself in Erik's war-torn consciousness had come upon him in a successive descent of guilt and arrogance; if anyone were to be given admittance to a plethora of fascination, of thoughts and their processes, Charles believed _he_ to be the chosen one.

It was this arrogance that drove Erik away, ultimately – something Charles was certain of. Yet by his being a telepath, Charles had saved the lives of those he loved without the use of force...or worse. He prided himself when thinking of such truths, but Erik was the single exception; Charles could literally lay self-slain in an effort to revive the man he had once known, and Lehnsherr would simply look on. A silence more absolute than the rising of the day star would come of his insufficient ploys, Charles knew. It sickened the mind reader to ponder things that brought only hurt and discomfort, and it was that selfishness that found him cut off and alone in recent months.

Charles wanted to touch his old friend. With his mind.

"Do you like the new look?" Erik asked, nodding his head forward, keeping his eyes locked on Charles, as he showcased the agonizingly-foolish apparatus he was now forced to wear. He did all these preventative measures to withhold any risk of an irrational act on Charles' behalf. Erik didn't _want_ things to go in the way where he was forced to forgo his future endeavors with the Professor, and yet did not trust himself to stop should those needs arise.

"It's quite lovely, Erik. I rather enjoy the arrangement of colors you've chosen." Charles was never one to lay his frustrations bare – to become a visible and visceral thing for all to judge, absolutely not, that wasn't the man he had shaped himself into. Charles had believed in reservations and composure - character traits that endeared the metallic genius hook, line and sinker in olden days.

"Thank you Charles. You're approval is of utmost." Erik smirked and removed his hands from within the soft fabric walls that had appeased his impatience but now only served as a distraction. He didn't trust himself anymore with the willing and readied metals moving so freely for him.

"Why are you here tonight, Erik? And for gods-sake, _where_ is Hank?" Charles moved forward, taking tentative steps in a exhibition of subordination and reverence. Always careful around a man that he never wanted to – and wouldn't ever – control. A dangerous truth he was forced to accept the day Erik had slipped Shaw's evil onto his own head; a testament to the level of distrust Erik continually felt towards Charles.

The Professor _loathed_ that goddamn helmet.

"Hank is fine, Charles, I _assure_ you. He'll wake up in a few hours and all will be as if I were never _really_ a threat. However, as lovely as this discussion of Beast tickles me, I'm not _here_ to talk about that blue-haired boy. I am here, my friend, for _you._ " Erik's eyes lit up in a crimson reflection, a swell of anger and deviance that forced Charles' feet to a deafening stop. "Er...ik?" Xavier had seen the instant change. Charles was unsure as to whether the pit forming in his stomach was a hint of what was coming to visit him, or fear. Perhaps the coldness rising up the length of his spine _were_ warnings one must begrudgingly follow to protect the betterment of oneself, of Hank and the kids – a daring escape from the confines of this metal prison Erik had just manifested seemed imminent.

 _Magneto_ had picked up on Charles' apprehension, and was using it, honing it, molding it to adhere to him so that he may turn it sharply against his dear friend.

Erik's reply came through a haunting smile that reached the edges of two deadpanning eyes as they peered deeply into Charles and the abrupt shift in mood. And yet, it was momentary, quick and done for before either had the chance to fully gain anything of it. Charles reverted back to the stoic, poised, readied man he always had been in Erik's presence, without so much as a ripple in his sweater-vested chest. It was his best – and _only_ – defense against a man who had no weaknesses, what now that he came complete with a permanent barrier between his mind and Charles'.

"You say you've come for me? What could you possibly desire with me, Erik?" Charles' words were gentle and yet dangerously precise; he wanted answers, and he wanted them _now_. He was prepared for anything Erik had planned but was completely unaware of how terribly awful the turn his life was about to take. If only he had been more thorough in his verbal or put to use physical assertions, Charles may have seen the future without using his mental telescope.

Erik's mouth twitched lightly as his throat contracted, his hands returning fluidly into the pockets of his pants, searching for the objects he knew were lying in wait. The metal was there for him, perfect and without accusation. His and only his to control and bend to his every whim. Erik felt the familiar lust of power roll through his shoulders, the tingles of pain and responsiveness the metal offered was almost as alluring as Charles himself.

And Charles _was_ forever alluring to Erik. A gravitational force of unbidden willingness and a peace he had never known existed until their meeting. Charles was everything to Erik and yet it meant nothing at all.

"Erik?" Charles questioned again, watching as his friends fingers looped themselves around tiny metal bearings that flowed up and out of ironed slacks. The objects reflected the dim lighting in Hank's lab, and Charles knew in that moment. Erik wasn't here tonight on pleasure... _had he ever been?_

Erik decided force was necessary, already sunken heavily enough in the power to refuse a turn around.

"Don't, Charles. Don't make this worse than it already is going to be." Affection? Regret? Charles wasn't entirely certain as to which emotive senses Erik was currently reveling in, but he knew this night wouldn't end well for one of them. Erik didn't speak after that, didn't find the need for it, though Charles heard every unsaid word as he stared on with nervous eyes; Erik was walking towards him then with fervor, as his hands spun the metal soothingly – frighteningly calm – with each step taken.

Lehnsherr had gone so far from himself, from the man Charles had known that _this_ person was nothing more than a stranger with ill intentions. A stranger with a gift he had helped polish to perfection. And Erik _was_ perfection to Charles, even now.

Erik's hands transformed the pieces of metal to join into one lethal weapon, his palm slowly moving beneath the newly formed – and much more impressive – metallic sphere. It was no bigger than the circumference of a golf ball; a surface just as imperfect but solid to its core. Reflections of their stalemate were glaring back at each of the men. Charles could only look on as Erik's fingers shot forward, the metal sphere sailing through the air as if the devil himself were riding saddle.

"Plea-" Charles had gotten out before his body fell to the white tile of Hank's laboratory floor. His eyes remained open as his head lay still, fixed looking down on himself, watching as tiny lights that danced and swirled across the plain white walls. He was shaking, shivering from the blow to his skull – not the force, but the action itself. His head had been struck by Erik's metal, by _Magneto_ , and it was something Charles couldn't fully understand. Not yet. Two blue eyes whirled disturbingly quick in their sockets, unable to focus on anything outside of the emotions and licking pain rolling through his body.

Pain. Pain was there, pain was always there, Charles realized, and this wasn't anything worse that what he'd been living with since Erik Lehnsherr had died and left him. Magneto was the only thing remaining now, wearing the face of a man Xavier would have, at one time, gladly died for. But he was the one lying on the floor now, hot blood dripping downwards from the open wound laying angrily on his scalp. He reached up, touched the laceration and bit back the agony of filthy betrayal.

Blind sightedness, confusion, and incoherence followed quickly. This unexpected event found Charles now staring _up_ at _him_ – ridiculing metronomes of _how could he become such a monster_ and _where did I go wrong?_ – playing ruefully inside of his mind. He felt his scalp again, eyes still swimming wildly in pools of loss and worry, searching for reason. Any plausible _reason_ as to why Erik would wish to harm his person – or actually follow through with such an act. Charles finally forced himself to stand on unsteady feet, swallowing the rising tides of bile as they rose within his body. He had to face this new enemy, wounded and suffocating from incomparable sadness.

Charles had lost so much.

"Er... _Erik_...?" Charles questioned, fingertips and palms now painted with slow-drying clots of cooling blood. His nails, normally cleaned, clipped and presentable, were coated with flecks of red, caked in a crimson polish that turned his own stomach. His eyes finally met Erik's, _no, he forgot, Magneto's_ , and it was then all hope was abandoned, left dying on the floor alongside the tattered remains of his injury, one square, white tile all but invisible now.

"Be quiet, Charles, and go calmly with me?" Erik propositioned, his hand still turning circles with the solid metal sphere that floated patiently above his skin. His eyes were fixed on Charles' own, aware of the harm done but his attention was forced to remain concrete and in tact. It was only when a line of blood ran smoothly down Charles' left cheek did Erik's throat tighten with the realization of what had happened.

It was the first time Lehnsherr experienced any trace of doubt as to whether he was in the right or wrong. Whether his own emotional hurt was worth the challenges that lay stretched out before Charles. _Was this self-righteous mission worth it?_ Erik hadn't questioned himself before, not once, not until he saw that skinny trail of Charles' blood making its journey down his face, falling slowly as it reached the edge of his jaw. If he could only...if he could _tell_ Charles rather than show him, but Erik had never been any good with words or heartfelt proclamations. He was violent and never asked questions first. He was raw and unwilling. Erik knew then he was bound to wear the void that laid accommodatingly over his thoughts, and Charles was being made to suffer the consequences of his arrogant personality.

 _Was_ it right or wrong?

"Go _where _, Erik?" Charles' voice was hostile and unpleasant, a hand holding on tightly to the top of his matted, wet hair, eyes rolling lazily now. "Bloody hell, that hur–... _why_ Erik?" Charles was searching for meaning as Erik quietly watched the pain mask his friend's proper face. The creation of unseen shadows washing over now offered depth to a man who had almost never bore his full identity openly. It wasn't physical pain with Charles this time, regardless of the visible evidence. No, it couldn't be that. Erik knew the physical ramifications of what a metal object striking into someone's skull could do, but he hadn't directed the sphere anywhere close to full force, thus removing murder from his nightly rounds.__

...for now at least.

It was Charles' anguish and heartbreak that Erik was using against the befuddled man that crept over his English features. He was abusing Xavier and taking the emotional realm to an entirely new level. Erik stared as Charles moved, inched, ached closer to him in an attempt to ease or stop the assault entirely. His blue eyes, well, they appeared faded and dull now, lost and confused, gone and gone and gone.

Erik instead reveled in his accomplishments, pushing away the guilt and refusing the tired voices that screamed inside the empty, hollow walls of his mind; they begged for him to stop this. To stop hurting his own heart. Erik was well aware of the shattering sounds and missteps the center of his chest was emitting – what with his hands now swaying visibly enough for Charles to see.

"My... _friend_. Don't. _Look_. You..y.. _ou hurt_ me, Erik..."

"Pleading is unbecoming of you, Charles," Erik said, his eyes closing for only a half a second, delving into an untapped strength he knew was required to finish this, to finish Charles in this initial phase. Hearing the guttural sound that escaped from Xavier's full, knowing red lips brought Erik back to the present, back to his future end game. He stopped to stare at the great man that was withering before him.

The _Magneto_ was fully born in those few minutes. The man who had once been a well of rage and seamless serenity had turned on Charles, fingers thrusting forward again to bring the great telepath down. The metal sphere shot from Erik's hand in a flash of sliver lightning, fast, fast, so fast – and it cut through the air, targeted again on Charles. It was Erik's only method, only true solution, only worthwhile shot to ease his friend's transition into disjointed unconsciousness.

And then it was over. All sound ceased, save for the labored breaths that came from Xavier's injured, still body.

Erik's green eyes were dead, his thoughts intentionally choked at the outskirts of his own mind. He was refusing any self torment that threatened to shake him of this devilish reverie, focusing rather on how to transport Charles without being seen. _Azazel_. He watched Charles lay on the floor – peaceful, quiet and calm enveloping him now – it was Erik's favorite qualities in a man like Charles. This rediscovery was utterly translucent to Erik, an awakening. There was precious blood on his hands now that told of such broken, bitter truths.

The blood smears, small and contained but telling, had reflected Erik's own face as he lowered himself down to retrieve Charles, and his throat swelled with anger, with pride but without regret. It was then he realized he was nothing more than a stranger in that mirror, a man he had never known, but someone eager to welcome home.

He burned the last remaining embers of his former self and stood up, cargo in arms.

 _"It begins."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3 should be posted rather quickly as I am really enjoying writing this fic. *grins* – Chapter 2 Update: based on my one lovely commenter, I've changed certain things in regards to descriptions and motives! Nothing astronomical, but noticeable just the same. Thanks for the amazing amount of views – makes me warm & fuzzy!


	3. and we started drowning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Raven mulls over her old life, while preparing for Charles' arrival with Magneto. Erik's journey from the mansion to their new home is relaxing and...thoughtful.

Raven stared at the rocky interior of her new home now, fully imbedded with the Brotherhood – with Magneto. It was cold there, alienated by the world and deemed the ugly stepchild – fully outcasted from civilian society. Forgotten. The compound was vast, endless even, but to her it would always be a foreign land – a black pill she forced herself to swallow with each long day. It wasn't comfortable or accommodating like her life with Charles, no, it was quite the opposite really.

Her blue, scaly hands ran along the concrete ridges as they rose and fell from all surrounding sides of the room she was in charge of. It was her way of _feeling_ the raw power in this new world she chose; through the solid, high rising barriers that encased her, Raven became equally hardened. But it kept her safe. Sound.

Well, Erik – Magneto – was her true savior now. His undying belief and the drive behind his mission allowed a freedom of self tyranny that she had never known. In all her young years, Raven was different, odd, incomplete. Magneto had opened those reptile-like yellow eyes and shown clarity on how wrong and misjudged her life had become. This fact was one of a few that contributed in her exit with Erik – his decision to leave the manor in a fit of blinding fury – and up until then, she hadn't ever come to arrive at such a final goodbye. It was as if she were shedding the skin of one life and growing entirely anew.

Everyday she continually missed Charles, with thoughts of her brother and how painful the separation had been always present now – a persistent thorn in her heel. Raven thought back to the physically pained face Charles had worn as he quietly looked on during their joint departure. His red lips were tightly woven together in an effort to fight the wash of regret that may have spilled from him that night, but it was those cerulean eyes that were all-telling. The telepath stood there, watching, waiting for them to turn around, never speaking a single word; Raven knew he would wait for the remainder of his life. She knew he believed they could always change their minds, and would never refuse them a return home.

 _Stay._ Raven recalls hearing that lonely word float into her mind, unsure as to whether it was imagined or if it had been Charles. It became an ache that born a regret so vast, she nearly had Erik turn around.

But she didn't do that.

She held onto Erik's stiff body as the tears rolled down her navy blue face, patterns of her skin interrupting the cut paths those hot tears might have taken in the long run. Magneto was her anchor but Raven could have easily collapsed after she could no longer see Charles on those grand manor steps. The black sedan drove them away, away and gone from her home, away and away from Charles. From that expansive name, that gentle face, those ocean-blue eyes, those welcoming halls, _all_ of her memories. Every grain of sand that amassed this foundation Charles had helped to create was slipping between her fingers now; everything meant so much, became suffocatingly overwhelming and yet...it came on the coattails of her own finality with him.

Three hearts were broken that evening, but only one would go on unfixed.

Their sadness was mutual – something her and Erik shared and worked together on in those early days – but pain was pain just the same, and it was insufferable. Raven often dreamed of Charles, young and ill-experienced with his mental mutation. Incapable of focus. She remembered night terrors that weren't her own, the fear she felt as they held her captive in those early morning hours, just before the breaking of dawn; Xavier's nightmares projected into her consciousness from a lack of control. He was unloved and forgotten as child, his mother too busy, too preoccupied, too vain, too _gone_ to pay him any affection. And his step father? Well, he was all but dead as far as Charles was concerned. And havoc was wrought on his young mind as a result.

So that left _her_. She bore the brunt of his disjointed mind in those earliest of days, but sailed those storms with him, helping him help himself. There were months, years even, of practice spent – his eventual progress leading to solid promises of never, _ever_ reading her mind. Charles wouldn't dare betray her thoughts or abuse his abilities because of how valued she had become to him. It was a simple as that.

Raven would come to never regret her time with Charles, even if the future were being built on torturous memories and a past too distant to follow.

 _Torture._

This... _room_ she was helping to manifest was making her sick to the stomach – making her weak and regretful and _small_ again. Of _course_ all of this concerned Charles _fucking_ Xavier, as if any other person of import would be so deeply sought after.

Her fingers felt too long, too short, to unsteady, too afraid for the tasks at present.

Magneto had put her in charge of, well, just about everything upon his leaving for Westchester, NY. The other mutants – _Riptide, Azazel, Angel and Emma Frost_ – and the final installments to Charles' soon-to-be hostel were opportunities to prove herself worthy. Yes, she was far younger, far more inexperienced and admittedly inept for all of her assignments but she didn't dare protest against the powers that be. What Magneto ordered was what Magneto wanted done. She would _not_ disappoint her new...new leader.

That didn't imply that the past she had once been so deeply connected with wasn't creeping into her every action, especially now in her current state of affairs. Her mind was torn between what was right versus the sweet memories of love and family that lain heavily on her heart; nervous hands were absentmindedly lining categorized objects atop a linen blue cloth. Raven laid the silver, sterile surgical equipment in neat, horizontal rows, two on top, two on bottom – the tabletops swinging out fluidly. The metal bearings were well oiled, readied, waiting for use. She finished and abruptly stopped.

Her eyes scanned the room, gray-shadowed rocky walls, a single metal table positioned in the center of the room, a flat, circular light situated above everything – shining too white, too bright – the stacked trays with Erik's preferred methods of torture, derived from personal experience with Shaw, no doubt. There were scalpels, dissectors, clamps, probes, needles, scissors, metal, metal, metal. "Oh god, _Charles,_ " she whispered, two shaking fingertips touching her cold lips as her eyes pulled shut to block out the terror envisioned. It was so easy to see what Erik, _no this wasn't Erik_ , what Magneto had planned for such a harmless man.

She felt as though she were drowning in a sorrow too great, too deep, to ever return home.

It was in that moment, the fire engine-red haired girl realized only two options remained before her: leave now, go back and warn Charles, or kill the lights on that scared, mindless little Raven-doll she had born to sustain a "normal" life. A _human_ life.

She knew it instantly – there had only ever been one choice.

Mystique left Raven behind the night she fled with Erik, her arm locked protectively around his own; she wasn't sure who longed more for comforting in their time of dying, but it needn't matter. They had left a man who would never _see_ , with all his brilliance, how terribly futile and faulty human beings were.

And she saw inside herself then how deeply Charles had broken Erik's heart.

xXx

The weight of Xavier's unconscious body was lithe in Erik's lean arms. Tattered strips of dirtied clothing lay between them as he carried the telepath in resolute peace; Hank's lab reverted back as it was before his arrival, but an array of commotion had left its own sort of wake on the place. As if pieces of his war with Charles remained invisibly attached to the cool air that circulated throughout. Erik couldn't have possibly cared any less. Exit and escape were his only known motives in that time frame; the risk of getting caught or losing Charles to his broody team of "X-Men" was irreparable to the mission. So Erik did the only thing he hadn't intended on doing that night: allowed a telepath entry to his mind.

The helmet was swiftly removed for his mental dialing, eyes locked on Charles should the injured man awaken.

 _"Emma, alert Azazel to my location. I've acquired the target."_

The mental void was replaced before he had received any incoming messages.

It was mere moments until the red smoke manifested itself directly in front of him, revealing a Russian man – scarred but unafraid. "Sir?" That thick foreign accent lacing his one worded curiosity always added a little extra something.

"Take he and I to the Continental – I've stowed it. It's time we go." Erik's words were set and directive. It _was_ time to be leaving. Even if he had only just arrived.

Another burst of black-red smoke later and the three of them were standing beside the only known road that lead to Charles' towering residence. The unleveled gravel shifted noisily under their soldiered boots as they walked determinedly towards Erik's nearly-invisible car. He carried Charles with the same ease as when he had left the manor, but care and reverence were only employed as a tactical chess move in this long game he had begun. Even if he was damn near throttled on killing the man in coming days. Tonight wasn't that night.

After dismissing Azazel – miles away now – Erik had taken a moment for himself. To marvel at his accomplishments and seethe into the character of the man he was coming to know inside himself. The Magneto. The metallic legend was in quiet inaction now, paused in state of repose to steal a thread of time for himself. Charles was his greatest lesson, his most powerful gain, a beautiful glimpse onto that other side, but a fated heartbreaking loss. And here he was now back with Erik – motionless, hurt and silent but most of all, _his_.

For how long, well that was anyone's guess, really. Erik counted himself lucky and used those ethereal emotions to carry him back to where he belonged.

The journey from Westchester to his hidden, desolate location was painless, relaxing even. Charles wouldn't resume rational thought for some time, Erik was sure, but he kept the helmet secured atop his head as an extra measure of precaution. One can never been too safe around the world's strongest telepath.

The onyx-colored Lincoln sailed smoothly through the night, stolen months before but his just the same now. Erik's hands wound themselves around the punctured leather that wrapped itself fittingly to the steering wheel and he contemplated. Right or wrong. Wrong? Right? Too many choices, too far ahead now, too late to turn back. Choices weren't exactly choices anymore, and this became a sobering thought that flood him with patience and focus. Erik would see to it that his games were played and more importantly, _won_ , at Charles' expense.

Erik's attention drifted as the miles rolled on, sneaking glances into the back seat at the strapped man lying there. His thoughts wandered to better days they had shared – as partners, as brothers, as members of a government team that _just wouldn't quit_ – but his being torn apart by Charles' emotional denial was where Erik's mind ventured. He thought of how perfect their bodies moved together, as if the rising of the nighttime moon pulled along more than just the ocean's tides. Their hands would hold, grip, release, feel, touch, _sense_ , tease and ignite emotions deeper than any other connection one could fathom. But Charles' refusal to give in to Erik completely angered and lit a wrath inside Erik that had brought them here.

Erik swallowed those memories, the familiar sting of betrayal and abandon rising high inside his throat. Blissful experiences weren't ones he wished to revisit, considering all moments of that caliber were spent with Charles Xavier. The same man he had just kidnapped.

There were other things to think of, simple thoughts of less import but worth mulling over nonetheless. Erik stared over the specks of Charles' blood embedded under his fingernails, saw them woven within the ridges and prints of his palms – hands impeccably steady. He had cleaned Charles's open wound as best as he was able, but hadn't taken the time to care properly for his own appearance. It was either a foreshadowing or a reminder of his love and hatred for the unmoving man lying in the rear of his Lincoln. He could see the white leather seat staining with a few drops of falling blood, the liquid sliding down between the grooves of the stitched upholstery. It wasn't much, but somehow that image was dangerously appealing to Erik.

 _No._ No more thoughts of love and no more thoughts of intimacy. Pain and anger only now.

Erik's mind turned off then, resigning himself to the only solution and only means of resolution to a night that was slowly ending with the rising of the sun. The sky burned at horizons end, where the dawn had just begun its steady ascent, waking the world. His eyes were shaded over with the shadow of his mental-gate, hands still holding tight and sure to the Continental's helm. Colors of orange and red, hints of purple, of pure crystallized yellow and deep blue danced poetically against the reflective surface of his trusted helmet.

Erik was lit up, shameless and purposeful. In that moment, Magneto was immortal.

xXx

Charles was nowhere. His mind was blackened with pain, thoughts too unkempt and unclean. Was that a slow humming he heard from far off in the distance? Perhaps. Very well may be.

Charles was nowhere now. Suffering too great to exist in the waking world.

xXx

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies on the delay! Summer is always so stinkin' busy, isn't it? Anyway, here is chapter 3. 4 will be along shortly, and things will get even heavier & much more intense! Thanks for the amazing amount of views & kudos! **Also, I know this chapter had little to no Charles in it, which is sad considering he's my favorite (!) but I promise him in much abundance come the following chapters!


	4. not like we'd sink any farther

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erik brings Charles to his new Brotherhood compound & the mind-reader's holding cell. There's a shower involved, a flashback and a semi-hysterical Raven.

The parked Lincoln idled quietly in the morning air, purring, whispering sweet metallic nothings to the restless man that sat in its front seat. Erik was still, retrospectively contemplating the next series of mapped objectives. Move Charles inside. Lock him down. Check with the others to see if his most recent midnight escapades had caused any newsworthy commotion in the mutant community _just_ yet. Clean the blood from his hands. Change his clothes. Check with Mystique to...well, to check _in_ with Raven.

Something told him his most trusted Brotherhood member would be...quite reserved in the coming days. She may even come to hate him for what the future will bring to pass, but such emotions were all for naught: inconsequential to his needs and that which he wants most: for Charles to _understand_ him. Yet Erik–he _knew_ the feelings Mystique kept hidden for Xavier – a brother yes, but a man she deeply cared for nonetheless – and still, neither of these withstanding facts were heavy concerns of his in that moment. If ever they were.

Erik was tired. The sun was well risen by the time he had returned from Westchester, green eyes heavy and worn. The day's end was well received, but Erik knew there were miles and miles remaining on this dark journey he had begun. There were many important tasks that _must_ be fulfilled before he was able to fully immerse himself in the sweet arms of sleep's blissful embrace – and in turn, he wouldn't rest until time allowed for it. So he set out to begin what would inevitably change the rest of his life with – and without – Charles.

Slipping the pad of his thumb and index finger against the cooled metal of the ignition key, Erik turned the Continental off but made no effort to exit. He turned around and looked at the _great_ , unconscious body of Charles Xavier and shook his head downwardly. The helmet was paining him with a building annoyance, having been there for longer than he preferred, but Erik knew unnecessary risks need not be taken. He kept it situated uncomfortably there, his light brown hair matted and aching for the calming touch of the sun's brilliance and the soft morning atmosphere. Resolutely, he accepted its presence.

Erik lost himself in reverie, his body acting against his ego's demands. Do not touch. Do not immerse or subject. But a bleeding heart beats faster than Erik fully realized, and when one hesitantly vibrating arm moved out to feel Charles, he couldn't will his mind to stop it.

"Old friend of mine..." Erik whispered, swinging his limb up and over the car's bench seat, silently tracing a fingertip over the dried line of blood on Charles' face. The heated skin of his finger continued on downward, over the edge of Xavier's jaw, pushing in over the steady pounding that _thump-thump thump-thump_ ed in Charles' throat, past the collar of his bloodied shirt and down into a place Erik's eyes could no longer see. He felt the heat from of injured body that was fighting to protect itself in those shadowed depths, where sunlight hadn't reached, and a chill tore through him.

Touch. The touch and illicit sensations of Charles beneath the roughened skin of his hands never left Erik disappointed.

He wanted so much more, wanted everything and wanted it to be given freely. Didn't want to _take_ it.

"You stole it all away from me, Charles. You we I...what _selfish_ pride you have, my dear old friend." Magneto returned as the now-emotionless hand retracted back into himself, all thoughts of shared desires gone. Gone with Xavier's bruised mind that was distant and blacked-out, brown hair stained crimson. Erik swallowed the remaining traces of that four-letter word that resonated inside his throbbing mind, and shook reason into him. He understood there was more than one deafening battle taking place in this present world, but accepted his trials and keep going on. Acknowledgment nearly freeing the monster that hid in those shallow black pools he was constantly filling.

These dual identities-these personalities of his were at war along with his schemes against Charles, forging a dangerous path of muddled emotions with varying degrees of rage. Erik wanted to remain Magneto, wanted Lehnsherr dead and buried, burned and ash-ridden. In an ideal world, anyway.

Then again, he had never _really_ received what desires that were kept alive inside him, and therein the eternal dichotomy Erik knew he was meant to traipse upon remained. More than likely for the span of his lifetime.

Opening the heavy metal door, Magneto slipped out fluidly, stretching two sleeping legs and cracking ten knuckles in preparation of what could arise from moving the subdued man. Only _if_ Charles woke sooner than he planned for, would his methods of a certain nature be required. He wasted no time in slamming the metal exit behind him, dust traveling upwards in a rising funnel from its wake. Erik looked up towards the sun, the glare blinding him, the heat radiating out powerfully, even still during these long, typically dark winter months.

Erik moved with ease as he grabbed for Charles, the rear seat larger than the resting telepath. The thick inside silver steel opened for him without the use of his hands as he bent to pull the professor out in one swift pass. One half of Magneto wished the professor awake so that the lessons could begin early, while his more subtle side begged him to remain unconscious. Erik's war burned on inside of him, every action, every inaction, every moment being ridiculed and assessed for weakness or recognizable dictatorship.

Thoughts left him as the short, lightweight body of Xavier formed neatly to his person. He looked over the man ensconced to him and paused for the briefest of moments. The mind-reader's head fell against Erik's shoulder but was perched downwards from its lack of control, two arms bounced languidly by his ribcage–gravity drawing them up and down with each step Erik took, tan cloth-covered knees rose high in a stilled triangle pattern as Erik's arm supported the unmoving burden, and two loafer-clad feet dangled disturbingly flaccid at the very end of Charles. It was a delirious sight for Erik. One he wouldn't soon forget.

Erik nodded, waved one hand and the Lincoln locked itself securely in place. He now set out on the short journey towards the fortress he and his Brotherhood were steadily building. A creation of power and force.

An balance to the imbalanced.

xXx

Charles' mind was swimming for a connection – _any_ – to wrestle and rope himself into in an effort to bring the return of his consciousness back. He felt lost, felt a darkness and a deep cold in the desolation of where he was now – _nowhere_ – and it wasn't a typical happenstance when falling into a distressful state of mind. At least in those rare instances, there were always another's mumbling thoughts he was able to retrieve with ease and find his way home with.

Xavier's rationalizations led him to a deduction then that he must still be in the presence of Erik, with that godforsaken helmet blocking him from the only tentacle of solace available. Though Charles searched on, hoping to meet up with another familiar mind or one that wouldn't offer too much suffering or pain – something, anything really, to placate the rising panic that was settling in his stomach. He wanted comfort and peace.

The feel to two arms under him was, thankfully, a point of reference in this abyss-like state of his, and Charles found comfort in the hands that held him close. Once again he supposed they were Erik's own cradling him, based on the sheer void that was shrouding his mental outreach, but without being fully aware, Charles couldn't be certain. Regardless, he focused on these finer details to sway his fear: the rising and falling chest that was nearest his right side, the possessive strength by two long arms as they carried him soundly, the low-sounding hums of breath as the person inhaled, exhaled – whomever's space he was occupying was quite at ease with their precious cargo. Charles wasn't sure how to feel about this idea of calm, especially since he was the canon fodder. He was hurt, and no other seemingly cared for that sobering fact.

And then there was the blackness; it was painful, sickening even. Charles just _wanted_ to hear Erik in his head, that sweet accented-German voice that was smooth and angry and superlative. He wanted sound and fulfillment, wanted to be embedded with Erik's focused thoughts and delicious monologues. Charles just wanted. He would have given anything in that moment to force himself awake, conscious and aware. _Anything._

Instead, he remained caged inside the metal barriers that were constructed against him. Metal, always metal.

He wouldn't allow himself the fleeting consolation angered words could do for him then. No, Charles simply wished someone would come and lie down beside him as he entered them gently, their thoughts open for him, pulling him home.

Charles wanted saving.

xXx

At the same time Magneto reached the ivy-covered iron doors of the Brotherhood's compound, he caught a shift in Xavier's expressions. Charles' brows were pulling tightly into each other, his lips thinning out-pressing against themselves.

 _Those red lips._

He paused, stopping all movement; the beating of Erik's heart raced erratically in response. _'Was Charles waking?'_ The question ping-ponged itself over and over, sweat beginning to accumulate between the small spacing of his grasping fingers. Should he rush and get Charles into the holding cell or wait? Wait and see?

Erik chose a pause rather than risk a botched operation in its earliest of stages. He stood there holding onto Charles, supporting the not-much weight of this important man and his mind reeled, thrusting back into the past. Erik knew he held onto everything when he held Charles, but chasing those thoughts would only lead back to the broken dreams that escaped him. The world around him was mute and yet high-tuned decibels rose steadily around them, circling as if they were witnesses to his treacherous mission.

So Lehnsherr remained still, statuesque and firm, and listened to the great, vast forest surrounding them; silent reverberations of the sights that befell the trees were spoken back to Erik as though they were _seeing_. The tall, swaying woods creaked and bent as the mountainside stretched out endlessly beneath their roots. It was as if the earth had recognized Charles and he, unsure as to whether they were a blessing or a curse. Unsure as to whether _HE_ was an angel or demon.

Erik's skin rippled as the air temperature adjusted around him, an irrational _'was this Charles' doing?'_ thought was his final act of waiting before he pulled himself back into the present. _Get inside, now._ He transitioned his primary modus operandi back onto himself and forced the doors open, stealing a glance back down towards Charles in a precautionary fashion. The telepath appeared to be in the throes of a painful dream – perhaps a nightmare – as he lay nestled in Erik's arms. His cheeks were flushed with a rosy shade of pink that spoke of fear and exertion, his eyes clamped together in an attempt to concentrate on something Erik couldn't possibly know.

The metal-bender stoically gathered himself and marched on through the first darkened tunnel of his – _their_ – new home, torn from watching Xavier's inner turmoil and that of dealing with his own insecurities. Soon he would see Charles' tropical-blue orbs open, aware and in the know, and only then could he begin his own form of personal healing. With dispelling punishment and power over _this_ man. It was Erik's only way of solving an identity riddle that was becoming a black plague over his strongest character traits: conviction and purpose.

There would be no saving, for anyone.

xXx

Charles felt his body being lowered; two arms that had once held him steady – dangerously close – were now in the process of discarding him as if he were last night's dinner remains. The presence of a smooth, ice-like surface manifested beneath his stiffened back, his mind still swimming in search of a lifeline. Xavier remained unconscious yet fully aware of his outer self. It was nothing short of mutational magic.

The next touch that met Charles' hands happened as they fell onto the solid metallic table resting underneath him. A shock of something freezing, a scent of sterile clean drifted into his lungs – Charles realized his nerve endings were slowly coming to. _'Wake up, Charles. Wake up.'_ He prodded his own mind – insufferably unfocused still – as waves of sensory bells and whistles began to toll thunderously loud throughout his fogged mind.

Like a cataclysmic splash of worldly transitions, every transient thing came rushing in, came rushing into Charles. A harsh awakening to a bitter reality, worse than he had previous imagined.

A light somewhere above him. A noise that didn't echo. An unfamiliar chill circling his _exposed_ body. Clothes, yes but?- yes, _there_ they were; Charles concentrated on the smooth cotton fabric of his dressings as they sat fittingly against his skin. Small wonders were appreciated in these confusing times, but Charles sensed they were to be few and far in between.

That white fire of light that hung above him was first to break this unwelcome reverie.

xXx

Erik disposed of Charles quickly into his own specialized room – a word he used loosely – and watched as the man settled himself; it wouldn't be long now, Lehnsherr knew. Charles was in for a fantastic welcome-home party, and it would be an event he wouldn't dare _miss_. As if there were any choice.

Leaving the telepath alone for a much needed reprieve – albeit short – Erik glanced back once more at the newly-shackled man laying atop a delicious slab of pure steel. Waves much like that of the ocean's torrents surged through him. _'Not now, Erik. No, not now.'_ Desire was unbidden in him now, two hands twitching with a fervent need to engage with the distressed, injured _Professor X_. Oh the movements he'd offer up to him, if only things were different. _'Not now.'_

But there would be endless hours for all those twisted little games Erik intended on playing.

For now, he forced an exit to take that fleeting moment and clean the unkempt appearance he had been wearing...and to have a chat with a certain yellow-eyed girl who was surely watching him. He felt her piercing eyes through the mirror that allowed spectators in, but refused players out; Raven had been awaiting his return with bated breath, he was certain.

Securing the door behind him, Erik slipped the helmet off of his head and sighed with pleasure – a release long time coming. The holding cell of Xavier's was prepared quite similarly to that of Emma's during her captivity at the CIA's headquarters – with an extra additive of mental barriers thrown in. Those innovative Russians knew how to defend themselves against mind-readers and arrogant men like Charles, and Erik prided himself on being thorough and precise. No unnecessary risks need be taken.

Wading through the halls of his vast empirical complex, Erik found his way easily to the room designated his and sat slumped atop the high-rising mattress. His mind whirred with ideas and plans, two fingers massaging the sweaty hair that laid matted against his temples. _'What a long day. No, no rest yet. There is never rest for the wicked ones.'_ Erik spoke to himself as though he were both the angel and the devil that taunted his tired shoulders; sleep was lusted after, but the time for that was certainly not now.

A shower then.

Erik had a full six and a half minutes of peace before Raven welcomed herself into his bathroom.

"Erik. Erik, I saw him. What did _you do?_ " Firm, hurt, scared. Her voice held all the emotions he had long sought after. She was so beautifully inhuman and yet humanity had overtaken her more often than not. She was a strength he would bet his last hand on, and this wasn't something Erik was accustomed to, nor fully comfortable with. Nonetheless.

"I brought him to me, Mystique. Like I said I would." Firm, unscathed, unafraid. He was everything he had known he could become. Well. Save for the tiny threads of guilt and morose morality that dripped here and there within him. They'd be gone soon enough, Erik would sparingly reassure.

"Eri-Magneto! His clothes are bloodied, his head is cut and he's unconscious. When I asked you to go easy on him, that wasn't meant to be taken as a suggestion!" Hysterics now. Erik knew they would pass, as she had no other choice.

"Mystique?" Erik questioned, stepping out from his shower stall to retrieve his waiting towel.

Her eyes avoided his, but they danced along the fine tuned lines of his body, and those arms and..."Yes?"

He smiled knowingly at her. "He'll live."

Raven crossed her blue arms beneath the two blue-patterned breasts that laid openly on her chest, her eyes on fire with concern and... _lust_. "You...Erik, I don't know if I can...it's _Charles_."

"Mystique, I don't have the time to explain why – _again_ – I am going through with this. Perhaps, had _you_ been the telepath you would understand, but alas, 'tis not the case." Magneto moved past her and into his room, dressing himself slowly in full muted-black attire as he mulled over his first round of-"Torture, Erik? You're really going to do this-do everything you've said you would to him?"

Erik sighed with impatience.

"Raven, I think you'd find it in your best interests to head back in Charles' direction, and I will join you there momentarily." An order.

" _No_. Erik, he is my _brother_. Please, I won't leave your side or this fight, but please, _please_ explain to me what he has done that was so terrible to warrant _this_?" She swung one of her slender arms out towards the door of Erik's room, actions speaking of themselves.

If a blackened cloud could have slithered itself above Erik's head, with feverishly-hot rain pouring down in great drops of hurt and betrayal, it would have been greeted as though it were an old friend.

And old friend named Charles Xavier. Erik's face glossed over with memories, Raven's question being the ticking time bomb that finally exploded in his hands.

"Erik?"

In that moment, he said nothing. His mind was screaming inside, the flood of his past with Charles coming to him in a succession of red and blue, of rage and serenity.

"Get out." An order Raven followed this time.

Erik fell onto his cushioned mattress, and then fell apart.

He remembered where it all began.

XxX

 _"Chess?"_ Erik's ears perked up with the familiar sound of Charles' voice as it spoke gently to him – inside of his own mind.

 _"Thought you'd never ask."_ A simple reply, Erik stood up and closed the book he had been reading, tiny particles of dust floating up and out into his occupied space. A sneeze. How _human_ of me, was a separating thought that jokingly played along the fine lines of his mutant awareness.

 _"The study in ten?"_ Charles was eager tonight it had seemed, and this was all well and good, as Erik had plans of his own for the blue-eyed beauty of a man.

 _"Make it five."_ Now who was the eager one.

On the other side of the great manor, Charles smoothed out the folds of his tan trousers. He had been sitting for far too long – alone, mind you – and it was about that hour when the children would go down and he and Erik could...well, they could.

Checking his appearance for the briefest of moments, Charles sent a final image of himself to Erik's mind and laughed lightly at the choked – _excited_ – answer the metal-mover had transmitted back.

Charles so loved being a telepath. He so loved being... _in love?_

Panic struck him then.

A tryst was one thing, sex was explicitly sex, but love? Real actual, permissive, submissive, giving, receiving, sharing, holding, understanding – _love?_ That was an entirely new realm he wasn't quite astute to.

Charles swallowed down something he hadn't felt since his younger, childhood days. Fear.

 _"Charles?"_ Erik was calling out to him now, the deadline of five minutes having past ten minutes ago.

The mind-reader hadn't moved from where he had been made fully aware of his current situation. Couldn't move. Wouldn't move. Hadn't the strength or courage to move.

 _"Feeling rather ill all of the sudden. Raincheck?"_ A filthy lie. Charles deceived the man he _loved_ because he was brought down by a fear to great to share the burden with.

This was the night Erik would come to taste his first doses of betrayal, but hadn't known its name yet.

That was the first night of a thousand nights and a million memories that would put him on course with this pain-riddled waking dream he was laying Charles in front of.

XxX

Erik shook his head with maddening fervor. His mind returned to the present after visiting a not-so-distant event that had _changed_ him. Looking around, the silence of the compounds walls brought back a peace of mind; Erik should have known his efforts with Charles past that night would be in vain.

But a fool in love is a man blinded by truth.

And revenge was best served cold.

On a metal slab in a telepathic's nightmare of a room.

xXx

The first thing Charles Xavier noticed was the dryness of his mouth. The second was the lack of focus from his eyes. Blurry. Everything was blurry.

If only things could have remained as simplistic. As painless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies on the wait AGAIN! But I made up for it with a longer chapter ;) So the story is moving along, things are happening, and flashbacks will begin making frequent stops along the way to tell the tale of why Magneto/Erik is totally off of his rocker! Hope everyone is enjoying this, and a warning for the upcoming chapter 5: LOTS of dark themes will be a part of it, so if it's not your bag of tea, I'll understand. Thanks readers – leave some words of wisdom so I know who you are - don't be afraid, I won't bite. =)
> 
> ** Chapter 5 will be up soon – don't fret my lovely readers, I haven't forgotten! <3 And thanks for the streamline of views; the milage on this story leaves me awestruck! **


	5. but i let my heart go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charles wakes up, a game of water hesitancy, a flashback told through Erik's words and Raven turning more and more into Mystique. **See bottom for notes on German phrases I've strung here and there.**

xXx

"Open your eyes, Charles." A God-like voice sounded out, falling flat against the thick walls of this compound.

Two drowning ocean-blue eyes danced chaotically in their respective spaces – almost disturbingly unbalanced – as the room that found Charles awake in spun circles around him. He felt as though he were being...held down by something strong and cold, by _metal_ -somethings, and _oh_ his head. His _head_ was a throbbing mess – a pounding greater than any arena rock concert show thumping rigorously in his head. The telepath made a quick mental note of the desperate need for water his dry tongue spoke of – really, anything of a liquid-based material – and hoped that was the extent of his worrying.

He would soon find out it wasn't to be such.

"Focus, Charles."

And then there was that _familiar_ voice again. Charles had thought he had heard Erik speak only moments before, but couldn't trust the waning consciousness and weak disposition he currently found himself in. Though it was apparent how wrong he wasn't. _Erik_ actually was talking to him right now, or rather, ordering him awake. From a place his swimming eyes couldn't yet see.

"..Er-ik?" Charles' questioning was met with instantaneous white-hot pain. His throat contracted around itself as the blinding overhead light was abruptly switched on, shocking him back into the present. He wasn't able to swallow the fear or the collection of dust that lain thick there now, back against his vocal chords and began to silently choke. _'Mind over matter, Charles.'_ He willed himself to settle, to calm and take a moment to retrieve peace and control.

"It's bright, I know. But I need you to focus right now, Charles." Erik stood behind the two-way security mirror and watched the telepath _squirm_ in the finding of a focal point to adhere himself to. "How's the head?" Lehnsherr added this subtle comment with a teasing laugh, his fingers slowly massaging the stubble on his chin. Erik had forgotten to shave in the rush of everything. _'Not important.'_

Charles felt himself coming down from the momentary rush of panic that flooded his senses and nearly sent himself mentally packing again. He supposed he wouldn't do well with a round two happening so swiftly. Xavier tried to move his hands up to his face and wipe at the dirt and filth that had taken up residence there, along with traces of dried blood and his still-open wound. Charles wanted to touch himself to simply know that he was, yes, he was alive.

Erik could have done an Irish girl proud at the dance that was waiting to erupt from inside of him. His feet felt lighter than air – his hands seemingly stronger than any other living force on this vast planet. In watching the movements of his bound friend, his lost... _partner_...Erik found solace and a hint of _peace._ It elicited in him a foreign happiness – the feel of a dangerous infection as it spread and overthrew the man he had once been. "Charles, don't fight the restraints."

"Magneto...a drink of..water w-would be delicate...i-i-in a moment like this... _now_..." The telepath stuttered his sentence, tongue getting caught against the sticky desert landscape that his mouth had become. Charles let his head lull from side to side, his eyes taking in the wide, expansive room he was being kept inside. Rock ashen-colored walls, low hanging ceiling, no _true_ shapely form, but then again, it was fitted with four cameras, and a thin metal fence-like piping that reflected its surroundings. It ran both vertically and horizontally around the entirety of his current arrangements – at least as far as he could deduce. Charles could only guess as to its true purpose. And supposed he would find out sooner than later.

Behind the mirror, Erik turned and looked at Mystique – she was rocking impatiently on blue-scaled heels and bit nervously on the sharp nails of her fingers – and nodded resolutely. "Take one the helmets, my dear." _**No one**_ was to approach Xavier without the protection of a mental shield within the barriers of that holding cell. This was a widespread order no one would dare refute; there were whispers as to the length of Charles' mental capabilities and it was enough to frighten even the toughest of daring mutants.

Raven wasted no time. Slipping the cool metal over her fiery-red hair, she poured out a small glass of ice water but suddenly...stopped herself. The cup was _metal_. "Erik, you won't...?" Mystique asked quietly, her back to him. Her head was poised sideways as she awaited his answer – if he would do her the justice of such. In this, like other matters, she was too afraid to turn and face him, too afraid to see the vindictive truth she knew would be there.

"Take it to him, Raven." Her shoulders dipped and slumped slightly at the strict tone in his voice. Raven's jaw tensed and locked on itself, lips pursed with lost words fighting to break through; Erik's desperate bout of games and play were beginning so early, and she was all but powerless in stopping them. All she could do was get close to her brother and _hope_ her presence somehow, someway, would make all the difference to him now.

Sliding herself as if she were a silent operative moving in tandem with the night, Mystique found herself on the inside of Erik's cage and standing beside his cornered prey. Her hands reached out for Charles, but discovering her forlorn reflection in the striped rocky walls and the pristine mirror, she stopped and thought better of her movements. It wouldn't please Erik to give Charles any form of compassion, this she was absolutely certain of.

"Water, Charles." Short, to the point, unsweetened with the normal Raven-traits Charles had once been so connected to. "I-I can't...could you...?" Raven's brow furrowed in on itself, forehead tight and creased as her hands shook with the cascading pang of sadness that rolled through her. He _was_ shackled down, he _was_ beaten, he _was_ being kept against his will. Charles was so many things and to him, she was the bringer of salvation, on a much smaller scale.

"Hold still...I'll _try_ not to spill too much." The metallic cup steadied in her hand as she brought it towards Xavier's waiting mouth, his dry lips having begun to crack already from neglect. Her eyes wandered to the left slightly, where those dried blood-red lines that painted his face were still a deep maroon and visibly present. Her stomach rolled on itself at the sight, even if the injury was superficial and easily compensated for. He was still _Charles_ to her.

"Rav--Mys-ti...que...ple-ase?" Charles was begging now, _begging_. His words were murderously low and painfully forced from his burning throat. It was all too much, far too much. Raven brought herself back to his memorizing eyes and forced a tight smile – her lips too thin now, jaw too tight, eyes too faded from the vivid yellow they had once been. Xavier noticed. "It's..o-k-kay," he assured her. He had always been the one to reassure her, in the darkest, most challenging of times, it was always he who would calm her storms.

No time for reveries, now.

She began to tip the opening of the cup onto Charles' lips when she felt the slightest of atmospheric pulls. She pushed on, attempting to match _his_ strength with her own and force even the smallest of drops onto Charles' aching lips. A tear escaped from her eye then, as she knew she was simply _no_ match to Erik and what he was doing behind the thin reflective glass – of that great big mirror lining this dreadful prison cell.

'Oh God.'"Charles, I'm...I'm so sorry but I...he's...I ca...n't," Raven choked out, her fingers releasing from around the controlled object. She wanted to _hurt_ Erik for this-this ridiculous game of power and chance. It wasn't fair, none of this had been fair on her brother – neither from the start of their dual exodus to this very moment. And she couldn't handle not _knowing_ why or how or when or what was _so fucking bad_ that Erik had turned into this demonic being...into this _monster_.

"ERIK!" She screamed, arms spread outwards from her taut body; she would beg for this single victory, if nothing else in the future would allow it, perhaps she could still have this one. "It's _water_ , Erik. If you want to play out these tricks and these hurtful schemes for hours and days on end, you can't-he won't survive long _without_ water!" Her long blue fingers curled into the palms of two shaking hands, eyes on fire with pain and want and regret and fear and passion and god _dammit_ she would get Charles a drink of _fucking_ water if her life depended on it.

"Mystique, please come in here." She tipped her chin up at the mirror but soon abandoned her rage, and resigned herself. At least he said 'please.'

She was hopeless.

Charles looked on quietly as she sulked her way back through the a hidden wooden doorway and out of his line of sight. The door, Charles noticed, was also lined with rows of vertically ribboned material that appeared to be in relation to what was attached to the rocky walls of his cell. A metal to keep his mind to himself, no doubt. He hadn't been completely certain before, but now was after the first taste of Erik's power plays. Things were bound to get worse, Charles realized, yes, terribly worse indeed.

Xavier looked up to find the smoothed, polished cup of water as it hovered above him – effortless show of talent from Magneto, no question – and nearly shouted out a plea to feel the chill of that icy liquid coat his sore vocal chords. "Oh _g-od..p-lease_.." he choked out, attempting to lick his bottom lip but tongue failing to reach its target destination. Every part of his head ached with a hit or denial from Erik. It was in that moment Charles wished he hadn't woken up. Not yet, at least.

In the control room, as Erik had so appropriately termed it, Raven found herself face to face with a madman. A reserved, stilled, directive, composed madman.

"What exactly were you screaming at me for, Mystique? You knew going into this what my intentions were. Why would even the simplest of pleasures – such as a sip of _water_ – be one of ease and not fraught over with? Why do _you_ assume order and insubordinately question what it is I am trying to do here?" His words imitated the sounds of a poor things slow death to her ears – distrusting, demeaning and degrading.

"No, no Erik. Why- _how_ can you assume I am going to blindly allow you to play these-these _evil_ , tormenting games with him? You haven't told me _why_ , Erik, _why_ you are doing all of this? So, what is so bad? So... _why, please_ , tell me. I need to know. I-I can't let you-I thought I could but I just can't. Not until you tell me why _you_ are so obviously _hurting_ by...by Charles. Still, even now, you're anger stems from _my_ brother. Why, you must to tell me why."

Erik's hands fell to his sides. At the same exact moment, an audible _"clank!"_ resonated through the glass of the mirror. He had unknowingly released his hold on the cylindrical object, and as water spilled out and over Charles' face, neck and parts of his heaving chest, Erik felt _that_ part of him waken again. Raven's spastic efforts wouldn't go to waste. He would share with her the story of Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr and she would finally _see._

xXx

Sunlight tip-toed its warmth across the glossy wooden floorboards of Charles' bedroom. Faded drapes – yet still a deep-red – thick and heavy hung from the ceiling, shrouding seven tall windows in their wake. The woven fabric barely moved with the drifting breeze bellowing about, sneaking in through the covered windows that were surrounding two silently sleeping bodies. Bodies that were wrapped into one another, legs twisted and locked, arms clutching, holding, keeping the other as close as a breath of air.

The light was peeking through fine slithers of space that were forgotten about, unattended to in the midst of their tryst the evening before – a subtle reminder that the world was waiting for them. To wake up, to start another day of training, to start another beginning with each other...to simply _be_. Charles was first to open his eyes, the illuminating glow shining just above one of his eyebrows; it was just enough to pull him from the depths of the nights terrifying dreams.

Dreams where he lost the ability to move his bottom half – dreams where Erik left him on a shattered, destroyed beach, his heart broken more than his mind – mutants of names and faces he hadn't recognized unless he submerged himself into Cerebro, which no longer existed. It was a terrible dream, and one he was glad to abandon with the rising of the day.

Charles "mmm'd" and "ahh'd" slightly as he unwound himself from Erik's tight, clutching form. The metal-man was still deep in the throes of sleep, and looked almost _peaceful_. Charles wouldn't dare pull him from that blissful moment of reverie.

Course the telepath hadn't planned on the sleeping giant waking at Charles' treacherous movements in exiting the grandiose bed. "Mmm _where_ are you running off to?" Erik's voice was quiet and still, much like his naked body as it lay beneath the soft white cotton of Xavier's sheets. Both men had been wound, no, _ensconced_ to one another, leaving the effects of such cool winter air – air that crept itself inside from the tiny spaces of an aged home – to become inconsequential to them. They slept in warmth and a delicious heat that only their bodies could have generated. But Charles' leaving had left a deep chill, an emptiness on Erik's skin that he hadn't expected. It was... _unpleasant_ to state the obvious aloud, as vulnerability was never a part of his German make-up, and so Erik settled for that teasing assertion of running off.

"...coffee, luv," Charles yawningly replied, running a hand through his unkempt hair and sighing away the last remnants of his crooked dreams. His eyes felt larger than his skull allowed for and as the palms of his hands rubbed them, he felt a pair of arms snake around his abdomen; warm and tattooed strength wrapped around Charles quietly as he fought to rid his memories of such horrifying tales. "What is it?" Erik's voice was probing but not interrogative. He had picked up on Charles' slight change of mood and was curious – concerned.

"It's nothing, really. Bad dreams are a part of this lovely telepathic gift I've been given. Or so it seemed as such with last nights resting escapades." Erik nodded his head gently, his warm stubbled cheek laying against Charles' spine, ears listening to the breath that was sucked in and forced out by a pair of lungs Xavier called his own. "Care to share the content of said nightscapes?" Erik wasn't entirely sure he wanted to know, nor cared for, the depths of what Charles would term a "bad dream" but being in his current place, getting to know the man you love – and just repeatedly _loved_ – sort of came with the territory. And who was he kidding. Erik wanted to know Xavier as well and as deep as Charles had come to know him.

"Not particularly, as it was a rather unpleasant bout of events. Surely you won't be put off?" Charles turned around to face Erik directly upon finishing his sentence and found two _slightly_ rejected eyes peering back. "Oh, well if...that's understandable, yes." Erik let go of Charles and shifted his body until his back was flush against the smooth mahogany headboard of Charles' bed set. The wood was old but comfortable, and it occurred to him then that there was no telling how many women were in this exact position before Erik had found his way here.

"Not as many as your presuming, Erik," Charles quietly offered, his eyes darkened by a shadowed section gone untouched by sunrise in this grand room. "Listening in again, _friend?_ " Erik poked, crossing his arms stoically across his broad chest, feet following a similar pattern down at the halfway point on the shared mattress. The cottoned fabric was dirtied in their desperate affairs of the night before, but neither had the inclination or care to rectify such trivial matters. Especially in comparison to the heightened levels of ecstasy they had discovered in one another.

"Yes that was quite...exquisite, wasn't it? Last night, I mean..." Charles' voice drifted off as he sat back down, the cool touch of his exposed right hip laying against the rough skin of a leg that Erik hadn't made to move. "Mm, it was indeed, _mein liebling._ " Erik watched Charles' smile reach the corners of those pretty blue eyes at the use, and subsequent meaning of, that tiny little phrase. Erik meant such affectionate assertions but wasn't quite in the mood to play these mental guessing games with Xavier, at least not in the way Charles was getting at. Erik took note that the telepath was reserved and pensive, of that he was certain, but why the man was purposely staving him off was becoming more than a little offensive.

Charles sighed in resignation. "Erik, I dreamt you left me paralyzed and brokenhearted on a desert beach, a calm blue ocean with raging battleships sitting neatly atop it. You were angry, so- _so_ incredibly _angry_ , my friend. I thought it best not to divulge such dreams as they were, again, only nighttime _games_ my mind tricked me into watching." Charles was looking down now, his eyes boring holes into the white fabric that was balled within his fists. How he disliked his sleeping tales, as they so often tormented him with things he wished would never come to pass.

"I...well, I wasn't expecting to hear that." Erik was at a loss for suggestive words and his talents for comfort were more than a little misplaced on a great day, so his hand reached out and touched one of Charles' thighs, fingers squeezing lightly. It was _his_ way of showing how attuned to Charles he had become.

"You can feel that, yes?" Erik asked, moving his body up to rest on his knees. His hand remained on Charles' leg, his other now moving to push the mind-reader down against the throngs of pillows that were settled at the small of his back. Erik lowered his mouth down and nipped his teeth against the soft, pliable skin at the top of Xavier's right thigh and laughed slightly at the tiny jump it brought about. "...and you felt that, yes?" Erik asked, eyes looking upwards to catch Charles' excited smile as he moved his head saying, _yesIdid_ in return.

Erik smirked and winked, then moved up and around as he eased his body down over the muscle of Charles' two _feeling_ thighs. His hands wrapped themselves deep within Xavier's wavy brown hair, his forehead coming down to connect against Charles' own. _"...and you can hear me, my voice, my thoughts, my, well, everything, yes? You can feel me sitting on top of you? Look Charles, look at what you do to me. You see and you hear and you feel all of this, yes?"_ Erik had channeled, knowing the message would be easily picked up and, above all, appreciated.

 _"Yes, Erik, yes I can...hear and feel you."_ Charles' hands were unsteady as they braced against the smooth, dimpled base of Erik's back, right above that perfectly rounded ass he, quite honestly, _adored._ His eyes clamped shut as he basked in the mental intimacy he was currently embedded in with Erik; a rare treat from a man who had all but forgotten how to offer selfless gifts to others. It wasn't a drawback to his relationship with Erik, but more an understanding, and one he wasn't swayed by in the least.

Course, Charles listened in to Erik more than any other mind simply because of how absurdly _loud_ the metallic genius would broadcast during most days. That didn't imply he was betraying anyone's trust, but rather, knew _more_ about Erik than Erik knew of him. Genetically, it was just his way.

 _"You're far away right now, Charles. Come back to me. I'm **here** with you, and you're not."_ Erik was touching the soft, sensitive temples on Charles' head and watching as the telepath returned back to him, back to this room they were currently in and the positions they had formed without guidance.

"Erik, I...I don't know what to say sometimes when it concerns you and I. It's... _overwhelming_ and, don't get me wrong I very much enjoy these moments, but what happens _when_. When we _locate Shaw_ and you are faced against him. I...I fear these dreams of mine are more than just nightmares." Charles let his head fall back against the same polished wood Erik had been fixed against not ten minutes earlier and sighed a long, questioning sigh. Xavier disliked this new practice of fearing the unknown – the _unknown_ part more than a little disconcerting – but it came with the Lehnsherr package and he resigned himself early on to accepting that.

"Charles? Do you... _honestly_ believe that I would leave you on a war-torn beach – or anywhere for that matter? And as a cripple no less?" Erik slid his body back slightly, the implications of Charles' words hitting him in a place he didn't dare name aloud. "No, no absolutely not. I was merely implying that I don't exactly _know_ how those events will come to transpire, and when they do, as they surely will, none of us are wholly prepared for the outcomes."

Charles knew _it_ the moment the words slipped from between his ruby-red lips. Erik hastily lifted himself off and walked around the room, collecting his clothes and the return of his sense of iron-clad pride as he made to exit. The four walls, the seven windows, and the not-quite-closed dark-red drapes had all become a stifling prison that housed a man Erik loved more than he cared to, or ever would, admit.

"Erik, I wasn't accusing you of anything!" Charles' words shouted out as the rustling of Erik's movements became too audibly high in this space they were occupying. Sharing.

Erik stopped, his black trousers were pulled on but unfastened at the top. His hazel eyes lit with anger as he stared back at Charles, who was now slipping his own plaid pajama bottoms on as he moved from his-their bed. "Erik, please. I...I _wasn't accusing you_ of anything." Charles stood in front of him now, his hands still and firm at his sides.

"Charles, you think that once we find Shaw, once we – once _I_ – confront him, that I will abandon you, seemingly hurt and brokenhearted because my mission is complete. I hate to tell you this, _mind-reader_ , but your forecasts are more than a little off with this one." Erik's words were spat out within a long line of offensiveness and defensiveness. Charles knew he had struck a chord with this one.

He chose his words carefully, pointedly but with truth and an honesty he hadn't told of before now. "Erik, your obsession with Shaw has ruled the better part of your life. You've spent more time _hating_ than any other man or mutant I have ever come to know. You long to _kill_ Shaw and I, my friend, cannot blindly stand by and watch you do such things. Is it possible that you have overreacted to my statements? Have you considered that _when_ you do that, as I have no doubt you will, that _those actions_ are the reasoning behind the heartbreak I may come to encounter? And lest us not forget that we are currently arguing because you forced me to share the details of my dreams, of which I have no control over."

Erik stared blankly at Charles, lips pulled tight and unmoving against one another. Finally it was there, the time to ask. Erik knew the one question that needed answering.

"Will you stop me Charles?"

Charles looked back, cerulean eyes focused but slighted. "Stop you from _what_ precisely?" Xavier knew the question before Erik had even spoken that earlier bit, but couldn't muster the courage to properly deny the man his one wish. Or crush his own erratically beating heart.

"Will you _try_ to stop me from killing Shaw?" Erik's jaw was set now, hands grasping the black turtleneck he hadn't yet had time to put on. He was scared for the first time in his adult life. Scared of losing something that had the potential to become more important than anything – even more important than Shaw – to him.

"If it means sacrificing my legs and our... _this_ , then yes, Erik, I will _try_ to stop you. Killing Shaw is not an answer, nor is it _the_ answer. My friend, killing Shaw will not bring you peace." Charles held himself as long as he could, his body beginning to wither from the inside out at his voiced decision.

 _"Verdammt notch mal..._ " Erik stutteringly whispered, betrayal and loss coating the black pupils of his eyes. "Even after everything you've seen of this man. The _monster_ he is and the things he had done to me...to my _mother_. You would still choose to save his life." Erik could say no more. He shook his head and nodded resolutely. He left Xavier standing there as he walked towards the door, focusing on the patterned cuts that made up the decor of the wooden baseboards. Lovely, really, this house was.

"Erik, I will never choose death over life. I'd rather you personally kill me than force my hand at such a choice." Charles turned himself to face the shrouded windows, his fingers slipping in between the thick halves of each curtain panel slowly. He longed to feel the sun on his face, the warmth of something absolute rather than the frozen lake his heart had just fell into.

Erik left Charles and headed back towards his own room, his _guest_ room, and anger began to flood him. Flashes of their bodies from last night and all the other nights before only served as a reminder to how utterly foolish he had been in trusting his heart in hands like Charles Xavier's.

Erik knew he should have walked away after that first bout of hesitancy from Charles those few months back. Perhaps he could have spared himself the guilty meanderings he was submitting himself to right then. He knew he would do well to steer clear and remain far off from the telepath from now on, maybe even leave and have done with it – cut his losses entirely – but that could be fraught with at another moment.

Erik only permitted the anger right now – all _else_ would come when he allowed for it.

xXx

"So as you can see, Raven, _that_ memory was one of the final moments I spent with Charles, before the events on the Cuban beach had come and gone..." Erik let his sentence and words drift away, the machine inside of his chest beating wildly out of control now. He had shared that god-awful day and the details that god-awful determining fight with her _now_ in the hopes that his explaining would somehow justify current actions being taken against the telepath. Justification for her to understand the series of unfortunate events that lead Erik down such a destructive path.

"There is so much more, Mystique, so very much more. Your brother is...we...I... _ich liebe ihn_..." Erik's eyes fell as he whispered those deeply seeded emotions hidden there, head falling so still as he forced himself to remember a happiness that hadn't remained; shame came to visit him in that moment. He was willing to finally tell _their_ entire story, if Raven so longed to hear of it, in hopes that Erik may resume the "healing" process without any further interruptions. If she understood him, she wouldn't stand in his way.

"Erik, I am here for _you_. Tell me. Tell me everything," Raven spoke nervously, afraid to hear all of the 'much more' that was mentioned but fearful of stopping Magneto, especially in such a vulnerable state of recollection. She wouldn't be the reason he would go on carrying around the hate that burned so viciously inside of him; the hurt that was tearing him to shreds.

If nothing else, Raven would work as Erik's tangible scapegoat. If she could absorb any of his emotional torment – even knowing of its origins with Charles – then her choice in leaving Xavier wouldn't have been all for naught.

Her yellow eyes were hesitantly pleading with his now for more, "we have time, Erik. Charles isn't going anywhere."

Erik watched as her red hair seemed to ignite with an even deeper shade of red, as if her blood was boiling beneath the surface of her thick navy-blue skin. It...was becoming a lure, a lifeline for his tattered, confused mind. Erik _loved_ but he hated just as equally the man bound to his metal, and longed for a resolution – a halfway point that might solve all of their shared enigmatic issues. Then again, he wasn't living in a fairytale.

"And more you shall have, my dear."

xXx

Charles lay quiet, his mind still searching for a connection. He was drawing on the last reserves of his energy by this time, but the cold soaking water that had splashed down onto him was keeping him conscious. At least some of that icy liquid had made its way down onto his face – enough to heal the burning in his throat but not nearly enough to satiate his needs. Charles was thirsty, achey and tired. He was sore and hurt. He wanted answers but didn't want them all at the same time.

The circular light was still blinding him as it floated above his shackled form – high enough to stretch its illumination across the entire room but low enough to allow a semblance of radiating heat from its bright center lamp. "Hello?" Charles croaked out, fingers crossing and uncrossing themselves in a repeated fashion of tentativeness and awareness. He was nervous – only a little afraid but curious all the same.

There would be no reply, nothing but silence for hours to follow Charles would come to discover. It was long enough that he was able to sleep – albeit unpleasantly against the metal table – and gain a better focus for the time he would spend awake. And what that time would bring, he wasn't entirely sure. If giving him even a sip of water was painstakingly slow and met with resistance, Xavier was becoming terribly unsure as to the future of his well-being.

So he laid there, slept, dreamed of Erik as he saw him before these last two and a half nights. Dreamed of broken spines and sandy red lips. Of shattered hearts and battle tears.

Charles dreamed of things that had torn them apart but had never been a reality to them.

xXx

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO SORRY for the delay in this, but I wrote an extra long chapter in the hopes that it would suffice! During parts of this chapter I've added several German phrases, as said by one key character (ahem) and they translated as follows:
> 
> "mein Liebling = my dear/my darling."  
> "verdammt noch mal = goddammit"  
> "ich liebe ihn = i love him"
> 
> Now being as I don't speak German (but how awesome would it be to actually speak German!) I've used Google Translate in the hopes that it didn't let me down, nor make a fool of this gal. Hoping it fits in with the dialogue as though I actually understand what the hell I'm saying, but if it doesn't, be sure to leave me a *nice* comment and I will fix it straight away!
> 
> So the story is moving forward (again, I have gotten a couple "confused" posts but I promise promise that things will appear in each chapter that will help the story along! It's going to be longgg so I won't give too many important things away in these early chapters - because what would be the point in sticking around if you knew everything, eh eh? ;) I'm rambling now. Thanks for the comments, kudos & views & be sure to drop a comment here and there if you like, love, or downright hate this fic (but be civil, yeah?)! <3
> 
> **Chapter 6 will be up as soon as mutantly possible (terrible joke, I know) but seeing as its the end of August, and everything happens at the end of August, time just wasn't there! Alas, it will be up within 2-3 days! Thanks again for the viewlove**


	6. it's somewhere down at the bottom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flashback early on, Erik finally starts what he sets out to do, Raven is torn and slightly immature. Warning for blood and torture themes (it's beginning..ahh!).

_"it's somewhere down at the bottom"_

Erik's entrance into the room that held Charles came as nothing short of a thunderous blur – one that shattered a stillness that had become so deeply enveloped there – in Xavier's mind. The arrival came as big and as loud and as abrasive as one would imagine, given the current circumstances; the angered man paid no mind to his belligerence, no, Erik simply raged on. Story time with Raven had stirred up memories...emotions Lehnsherr had thought long ago buried – love, affection and a sorely broken heart, to name a few – and it had left him worse for the wear.

"Charles, wake up. N-NOW!" Erik's hands were fevered and rushing around, displaying a blood-thirsty need for rigorous control. Charles could do nothing. Nothing but lay there in fear and in...awe.

"I'm a-awake...Erik." Xavier's lips nearly bled again from the lack of water and sudden speak, and as those three words left him, Charles knew the hours had worn him down. A malnourished and more than a little panicked telepath was brimming with fear. Would his eyes see daylight again? Would he taste the sweet luxury of food once more? Would... _could_ Erik possibly let him go without harming him any farther? One question in succession of another and suddenly, Charles's mind was lost: an inept rowboat taking on too much ocean. Sinking and sinking, drowning into the murky depths.

The overhead light switched off then – first time in what Xavier had felt was near to twenty-two hours – and his eyes fought against the abrupt darkness. Surrounding him wasn't absolute blackness, but rather a soft glow of ambient light emanating from the side walls; residential lighting had been drilled into the four corners of his cell for just this purpose, or so he supposed.

Of course, this was irrelevant to Charles, as his pupils had been all but seared with a high-wattage bulb for the better part of a day; he couldn't force his lids open if his next breath of air depended upon it.

"...bright, Erik.." came his quick response. Charles hadn't thought that through – realized then that perhaps he would do better to remain silent. Those tardy meanderings came too late and as Erik struck Xavier hard against the jaw, an explosive jolt of energy and regret surged within. Erik's fist was tight and concrete-solid; it was an impromptu strike but not one meant to obliterate consciousness. No, that swing was, for all intents and purposes, to show who held all the power amongst the two of them.

Charles didn't dare speak unless spoken to again after that.

xXx

"Erik. Erik maybe...maybe you should..calm down before going back in there?" Raven's words and tentative fingers were easing themselves close to the metallic madman, reaching out for reason. She wanted to comfort him – hell, wanted to _be_ the comfort he sought so deeply for – but knew his resolve didn't lie with her. It lain strapped and shackled to a steel table – worried, confused and utterly alone.

"Charles-he probably just _needs_ you to...I don't know...tell him? Erik-Erik please? Just, _stay_ with me for a little while?" Empty sentences and pleads of uselessness were all met with Erik's contempt; Raven could have been speaking to a brick wall for all he had obliged. Her voice was frightened and weak – two things he would sooner ignore than acknowledge outright, or worse yet, give in to. He began to storm out and away from her, too angry – too irate to listen to another syllable of how best to prevent Charles an injury he most certainly deserved. It was then he caught sight of himself in the rectangular mirror of his bedroom, rage momentarily subsiding.

Erik's eyes were a crimson-red – bloodshot and weary. The stories of old he had revisited with Raven, _ever_ so poetically mind you, had taken a visible toll on him: nose and nostrils – raw from the swipes of his cotton-fabric sleeves, ears – an illuminated ruby from too-many touches, cheeks – flushed with the similar appearance of his other features yet dimpled with laugh-lines that helped stave the pain away. It was all evidence that lead to a single conclusive truth: Raven recognized a hurting man when she came across one, and Erik was _not_ the exception. It was as both unsurprising as it was shocking.

So she kept on. Using this duality as cannon fodder.

"Erik, listen...listen to _me_. Charles ca- _can't_ do you any more wrong. Don't you see? You hold _all_ the cards. **You're** the one in control. It's okay to be angry but...but maybe let me lessen the burden you're carrying? Just for right now."

Her hips swayed towards him – two navy-blue feet inching closer and closer still. Hesitant. Afraid.

Erik was busy still, staring at the foreign reflection before him, eyes too unknowing to fully _see_ any trace of the strength he possessed not a single day earlier. _If you could hear me now, Xavier._ He talked inside of his mind, knowing Charles wouldn't overhear, yet wishing he somehow would – somehow could. If only so that someone could reign him in, bring him back from this nauseating precipice. The point of no return was upon them.

Erik's thoughts were sharply interrupted by Mystique's exploring hands. _Touch_ was not what he wanted in this moment – not even in the same solar system of things he desired right then.

"Raven, no." Magneto's voice returned, as firm and as sure as it had ever been. His verbal assertions were ignored as her hands wound themselves around his neck, touching his locked jawline as they went. "Be with me tonight. Let Xavier go...for just tonight."

Erik nearly snapped her in half. Raven was downright intolerable on most days but what had made it all the more infuriating was her simple-minded offering to him. "Let him _go_?" He stepped back from her, watched silently as the yellow glean in her eyes reflected a reawakening of fear. It was the last thing – the very _last_ thing – Erik had seen before making his decisions to finally leave the room and walk the path to Charles.

He'd had enough.

"Right. Mystique, go away. Just get away from me." Erik's lips were as pencil thin and as fine a line – as though they had been sketched onto his face. Stoicism and poise returned, suppressing the rage to a simmering boil, bubbling beneath the surface of his skin.

He could face Charles now with enough resign – enough anger and _hatred_ – to begin that with which Erik had been waiting for.

He hadn't noticed Raven's quiet, discerning exit. No, Erik was simply pleased he could no longer hear her disloyal begging, her girlish whims. All actions that would be dealt with accordingly at a later date.

He flattened out his black slacks, smoothing his hands over and down his legs evenly, and nodded for himself and himself only.

 _If only you could have heard me then, Xavier._

xXx

Charles hadn't fully regained his eyesight just yet; widening black pupils were still fighting against welcomed darkness. His hands were sweating as they folded open and closed within themselves – their only moveable companions. His legs were busy shifting in an attempt to escape. Futile, Charles knew, but he couldn't let himself go quite that easily.

Erik observed Xavier quietly, his fingers resting against the bone of his ribcages. "I'm not _entirely_ sure where I want to begin with you. I have so many plans, so many. I have so many things I want to show you, to tell you. I... _oh_ Charles, I'm just as excited as you are...perhaps more so to learn where this adventure will take us next." His tone was almost incredulous to Charles; how Erik could have slipped so far away from him was still a remorseful pill he was forced to swallow.

Charles pushed his emotional state aside, now more than ever wanting to grab for his bruising jaw and rub it back into a pain-free state. The radiating heat and swollen skin burned hot against the steel of the table and it was then he felt the pressure building beneath his filthy slacks. Bad timing. His eyes opened and shifted downwards, two blue orbs settling on his belly as he worked to avoid Erik's piercing glare.

"What's that?" Erik asked, following Xavier's gaze and walking closer to the bound man.

Charles refused to utter a single word, remembering his earlier mistake. "Good of you to refrain your speech, Charles. I'd have been obliged to even out the colors on your new face. Actually..." Erik spoke and finished abruptly, running around to the other side of the table and stopping – pausing – to switch the overhead lamp back on. "...there, that's better. Now I can see the differences."

Burn. A familiar burn Charles had wished never to feel again. Especially considering it wasn't physically touching him. That _fucking_ light. If anything were to jumpstart his insanity, it would surely be that hanging lamp. Not the silence nor the aching pressure in his bladder, it would be that god-forsaken white light.

Another slam came raining down beside his head on the metal table, an indentation that Erik quickly fixed without so much as a twitch of his head. "Damn. It seems I've _missed_." Erik teased, leaning his head down over Charles, grinning like the twisted soul he was so visibly baring.

"Let's get you out of these, shall we? You're quite unkempt Charles and _I'm_ slightly taken by your appearance. I'll admit to that much." Erik was playing with the fresh thrill of power he held over the telepathic professor, his German eyes never breaking focus for even the smallest of moments.

Erik began to unbutton the grey sweater-vest Charles was still wearing, slowly moving his fingers down the warm body that lain beneath the thick fabric. "I've always loved you...r attire, Charles. Have I ever mentioned that?" Charles didn't so much as move in response to Erik's rhetorical question; he wouldn't offer any part of his sanity for Erik to tear down and serve back to him. This was a game he knew his once-partner would quickly ring victorious in, pride all but gone.

Heavy pressure applied as Erik's hands moved against Charles – first with the winter-like vest, then with the all-too-business white shirt, ending with his fingers pulling on the soft white cotton of that final undershirt – all making Xavier visibly shiver. "Ahh...I very much enjoy that. I've always liked it when you _feel_ so openly for me Charles. Or had you forgotten so much already?" Erik's fingers tore the clothing violently from Charles then, his nails raking fresh wounds against the fevered skin of Xavier's stomach.

A held back, muffled cry. Not even a physical attack had slit the space between Charles's tight lips enough so that sound could escape.

"So incredibly beautiful when you fight me Charles. So goddamn, incredibly _fucking_ beautiful. I can only imagine what that mind of yours would do to me, had it the opportunity." Erik spoke with confidence and control as he tapped a single finger against the cooled metal of the helmet's exterior. "Alas."

Charles's eyes stared downward still, an attempt in keeping his body and mind as together as he was able. His need to urinate was becoming insufferably irksome but he wouldn't betray his strength in his refusal to speak. It was his only defense. He tilted his head then to rest against the frigid, gray steel, his red-purpled cheek reveling in the effects it was brining his angered jaw.

Erik ignored Charles's tactics and shifted so that he could slip his two hands beneath the hem of the mind-reader's trousers. The belt unbuckled itself and flew from Xavier's body just then, hitting the wall hard before dropping down below Charles's line of sight. "This was always my most favorite part in spending quality time with you. Exposing you, _seeing_ you for who you _really_ are. Or...did you forget all that, already?"

The pants came off easily at first, but hitched on the rounded crest of Charles's ass for the briefest of moments. Erik's breath caught in his throat at the sight, his tongue sliding along the hem of his wanting lips. Erik quickly checked his focus, resumed his actions and lifted Charles. It was just enough to touch the skin he once paid so much attention to, Erik's stomach twisting in a war of power.

"Mm...haven't changed a bit, have you?" Mind games, spinning and as devious as these were, Charles realized, he would silently play along. Biting his bottom lip to stave off the desire that rushed through him, Charles forces the residual sensations of Erik's fingers down and away. It was most definitely _not_ the time.

"You're very...quiet. Haven't you anything to say, Professor?" Charles looked down then, turning his head up and away from the side of the table to see his naked, semi-bloodied form stretched out. Erik had taken his clothes from him...but _why? _, was becoming another question looming largely overhead.__

 _Erik waited patiently for his old friend to speak. Nothing came._

 _"That was all well and good, but now the actual fun begins." Erik didn't move, didn't wink or twitch or so much as click the roof of his mouth. And yet. Metallic objects floated over and into his waiting hands just as quick as if he had asked them aloud to do so. A scalpel in one hand, a syringe in another._

 _"Do you know what I'm going to do to you? Better yet, do you know _why_?" Still, Charles said nothing. The time was now. It was here now, the beginning of his end – something Xavier had feared in the darkness that hadn't stayed. _

Erik paused no more.

Swinging his body around in predatory fashion, Erik aligned himself with the best view of his subject: one that allowed Raven, Riptide, Angel and Azazel a line of sight to watch his every move – should they so desire.

"Look at me Charles." Charles moved his head to stare into Erik's lifeless, vengeful eyes, silent tears beginning to pool and slowly fall down the sides of his face. Who this man was, Charles couldn't say for any amount. "You would have let Shaw live. You would have let _me_ go on living, knowing that such a monster was still in the world, haunting me, threatening me; let him go on breathing, existing, hell, _KILLING_ people – and for what? WHY Charles, I need you to tell me why?!" Erik's air was exhausted, his hands shaking with the metal objects he held so tightly to...and ones he wasn't attached to at all.

Erik sliced a slanted line straight across the soft patch of skin where his nails had previously left their aftermath. "This, _this_ is what it felt like when you said those words to me. Don't you remember? When you told me that _you_ would have rather been killed than to have had me murder Sebastian Shaw."

Erik repeated the fashion in the opposite direction, completing the line drawing to form a perfect "X" on Charles's belly. "And _this_ is what it felt like to hear those words over and over again in my head as I left your room. As I walked alone back to that hell waiting in the recesses of my head. As I left...you."

Throughout the pain, Charles said nothing. His eyes were sealed shut by the agonizing pain from Erik's tools, his mouth and lips pulled apart forming an imperfect O. The assault had been quick and precise, leaving Xavier with a suffocating sting, the hallow of his bones rattling in outspoken rejection. A gasp had been the only sound to escape his lungs, the level of hurt now creeping close to the point of him welcomely walking into unconsciousness.

Erik watched, waited, stopped.

The German dropped the scalpel and watched as it fell to the cement floor; he listened to the familiar clang of metal as it resonated a feel of home and shut his eyes in momentary repose. "See what I have to do now? This...this _betrayal_ you've left me with. This...agony I wear so deeply in your name, it's all I can think about and all that tells me I am still alive. But...I am without you now Charles. I...I never wanted to be without you. But I **had** to kill Shaw. Don't you see this now? Can't you understand?"

Charles knew Erik was losing his stronghold on the situation – perhaps shame had become a factor at the sight of an inky pool of red blood forming beneath Xavier's nude underside. Yet, he also knew it wouldn't be long before Erik had regained a composure he long ago perfected. The war had taught Lehnsherr a great many things, one of which was employed as a constant: allowing the entry of fear or regret only weakens those of whom give in to it.

Erik remembered the liquid-full syringe he held tightly in his left hand and brought it up to rest in Xavier's eyesight. "Do...do you know what this will do to you?" Erik asked, tiny beads of sweat tracing the short hairs that framed his forehead.

"Erik, I must ask to use a restroom. I'm afraid I'll need put these-these _things_ you're doing to me on hold, as my need to urinate is simply overwhelming at current." Charles's voice was forced, rushed and wavered from the sweeping waves of anguish he was reeling from. He had purposely spoken in that moment, throwing Erik into a distractive loop. Clearly, it was an attempt to gain even a shred of dignity or control. Charles knew he needed a leg up then more than ever.

The syringe was placed down on the tray table from whence it had come, Charles's words having born an affect on Lehnsherr. Erik's face told of no surprise nor incredulity though, so his future remained uncertain, and worry had begun to build once more.

"And here I thought you could have made it through without a word." Erik's fist flew outwards and connected directly with the other side of Charles's face, one knuckle striking his left temple and sending an entirely new set of pain throughout his torn body. "Oh g-god..." Xavier quipped, his hands still clenching, reaching, searching themselves for any means of comfort. His mouth was quivering, teeth clattering damn near to the rattlesnake's song as confusion set in. Two blue eyes fought to remain aware.

A 'tsk tsk' crept from Erik's mouth as one finger waved from side to side; the response to Charles's suffering cries was offered as though he were a child.

"I'm not god, I'm Magneto."

xXx

Raven watched on as Erik tortured her nude, frighteningly-silent brother in the room she was privy to have a view into. Her body fought between sorrow and regret – torn from head to toe between love and loyalty. Why, _why_ had Erik forced her to choose? Had she known prior to leaving Xavier Manor, perhaps she...no,...but then again.

 _Charles_.

She couldn't breathe without stitches of pain now, let alone remain to see this night through. Standing quietly as the others watched on, she moved to the back of the room and inched her way gone. Raven could know what Erik was planning...what Erik was _doing_ , but that didn't imply her being made to see it as it unfolded.

After it all, it had only just begun.

xXx

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO INCREDIBLY SORRY for the delay in this chapter!! Oh life, how you go and get so ridiculously busy. But alas, here it is and I hope it's enjoyable. This is the first of a few dark chapters, so I understand if I lose some readers from this point on. And speaking of readers...HOLY HELL views <3 I love ya'll like, a lot. Just so you know. ;) Chapter 7 had already been started, so that will be sooner than a month.
> 
> Dang, I waited almost a month? Excuse my lameness!
> 
> Thanks friends/readers/non-registered users!
> 
> OCTOBER 19: *******Chapter 7 is COMING, I promise. I actually just went back and edited this chapter, as I found it wordy and a little runny, so blame my distractive nature on never being satisfied with a final draft! Anyway, look for more this week!*********


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